Freshness, Persistence and Success of Scientific Teams

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Boekhout, Hanjo D., Heemskerk, Eelke M., Pisani, Niccolò, Takes, Frank W.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Boekhout, Hanjo D.
Heemskerk, Eelke M.
Pisani, Niccolò
Takes, Frank W.
author_facet Boekhout, Hanjo D.
Heemskerk, Eelke M.
Pisani, Niccolò
Takes, Frank W.
contents Team science dominates scientific knowledge production, but what makes academic teams successful? Using temporal data on 25.2 million publications and 31.8 million authors, we propose a novel network-driven approach to identify and study the success of persistent teams. Challenging the idea that persistence alone drives success, we find that team freshness - new collaborations built on prior experience - is key to success. High impact research tends to emerge early in a team's lifespan. Analyzing complex team overlap, we find that teams open to new collaborative ties consistently produce better science. Specifically, team re-combinations that introduce new freshness impulses sustain success, while persistence impulses from experienced teams are linked to earlier impact. Together, freshness and persistence shape team success across collaboration stages.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2507_12255
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Freshness, Persistence and Success of Scientific Teams
Boekhout, Hanjo D.
Heemskerk, Eelke M.
Pisani, Niccolò
Takes, Frank W.
Digital Libraries
Social and Information Networks
Team science dominates scientific knowledge production, but what makes academic teams successful? Using temporal data on 25.2 million publications and 31.8 million authors, we propose a novel network-driven approach to identify and study the success of persistent teams. Challenging the idea that persistence alone drives success, we find that team freshness - new collaborations built on prior experience - is key to success. High impact research tends to emerge early in a team's lifespan. Analyzing complex team overlap, we find that teams open to new collaborative ties consistently produce better science. Specifically, team re-combinations that introduce new freshness impulses sustain success, while persistence impulses from experienced teams are linked to earlier impact. Together, freshness and persistence shape team success across collaboration stages.
title Freshness, Persistence and Success of Scientific Teams
topic Digital Libraries
Social and Information Networks
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.12255